Swings and roundabouts

[altariel]

Yesterday I had a brilliant day in London, poking around the National Gallery's somewhat small display of Spanish art. I turned a corner and was mesmerized by Zurbarán's St Francis in Meditation, which influenced, and is being displayed alongside, an exhibition of paintings by Alison Watt.

Today I'm feverish, have a banging headache, and feel like crap. Such is life.

Comments

[kendokamel.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

I hope you feel better!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'm going to nuke myself with ibuprofen and then have a Really Good Nap.

[megthelegend.livejournal.com]

LOL, oh, that sucks!!!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Oh well, at least I get a day in bed!

[megthelegend.livejournal.com]

Is true! A day in bed is never a bad thing.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

The ibuprofen and bed approach seems a sound idea -- hope it works swiftly. I'm sure you'll remember the exhibition long after the headache &c have disappeared.

[fallingtowers.livejournal.com]

Get well soon!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! (Nice cup!)

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

Gosh, I've never seen St Francis look so sinister! I hope you're better soon.

Such is life.

I can never hear or read this without thinking "Such is an Essex bowler." But he's retired now.

[communicator.livejournal.com]

Lots of liquids. I thought all the bloody illness had passed over us now. Hope you feel better soon.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I thought I'd missed out on this round of lurgies, but this one pounced from nowhere.

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I hope naps and ibruprofen helped with the headache and fever, and you can just give yourself a day of rest.

I do like picture of St Francis. He appears to be clutching a pitcher - I don't know if that's unusual in representations of him, but it seems more domestic and more practical than some pictures of saints. I am glad you had such a brilliant day yesterday.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

It's a skull, looking up at him. Maybe he's about to do "Alas, poor Yorick!"

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

I checked it again on this monitor, having looked at it at work at lunchtime, and now I can see it's a skull.

Now I want to see a picture of St Francis with a pitcher, damnit!

I wonder if he does other scenes from Shakespeare too?

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

In Orthodox icons of the Annunciation, the angel usually finds Mary with a pitcher of water instead of the book she's nearly always reading in the Catholic versions. It does seem more likely, but then with a woman maybe we'd rather she was doing something educational?

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think I prefer Mary to be reading books.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Isn't she sometimes depicted sewing?

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

Sounds plausible, but I can't remember one. katlinel is right, it's nice that Mary and her mother (St Anne - hence the formerly all-women Oxford college) are often depicted with books.

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

Now I want to see a picture of St Francis with a pitcher, damnit!

To be entitled "Every Pitcher Tells a Story".

Sorry!

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Oh, well done, sir!

[katlinel.livejournal.com]

*sniggers*

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

Glad that you had a great day yesterday, but sorry to hear that you've picked up a London germ. (Whatever happened to "germs"? It's all "viruses" and "bacteria" nowadays.)

Get well soon.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

We still call them germs! (Actually, we call them "grems".)

[the-wild-iris.livejournal.com]

Glad you had a good day at the gallery; sorry you're feeling so rotten! Do coddle yourself and I hope it passes soon.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I've spent today watching Westerns and moaning slightly. Seems to be helping.

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Get well soon. I hope it wasn't London wot done you.

I watched an Inspector Dalgleish BBC two-parter with Martin Shaw the other day that a friend lent me - he was still looking good! Well done, Martin Shaw.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

I couldn't get warm the day before I went down to London, so this time I can't blame the Big Smoke.

I really like those BBC Dalgliesh stories! Martin Shaw's great in them. They're so much better than preposterous Judge John Deed. Although I'd like Lewis Collins to turn up in one of them and they could ham it up at each other.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

I saw Lewis Collins in theatre once, and he was truly bad.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Poor Lewis, he's a bit of a Darrow.

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

He was having this sickening romance with this Cambridge lecturer, and we were all yelling at the screen, "Go back to Bodie! He loved you!"

[altariel.livejournal.com]

"She'll never roll over the bonnet of a Ford Capri for you!"

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

"Or with you!"

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Hee, yes, more importantly!

[glitterboy1.livejournal.com]

Ugh, that sounds rotten, especially when, by all rights, you should have been able to spend the day gloating over the fab time you had the day before. :-(

I hope that today's been better.